Customer Reviews

The Art of Maya: An Introduction to 3D Computer Graphics

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This book is an interesting combination of styles... It's not a tutorial book and it's not a gallery of pretty pictures either. It actually comes across more like a promotional pamphlet than anything else. The book will show a picture illustrating a feature of Maya, then explain the benefits of the feature in general terms, and occasionally give a hint about how to actually use the feature in the software. It's probably too general to be of much use to a Maya beginner (or at least there are better books for beginners) but it does give a pretty nice overview of computer graphics concepts in general. Seasoned Maya users certainly won't find much use for the book (try the Killer Tips book for a similar feel but more useful information) though the last 20 pages of the book contain some interesting tales about how Maya is used by the professionals. This certainly isn't a bad book; it just seems to go in too many directions and tries to cover too many topics in too little space.

First off, this book has very little to no procedures, step-by-step lessons, etc. I found this book to be great to be used in conjunction with a foundation book to learn Maya, or other 3D Software. The book is filled with little tidbits of information that you would not get unless you were immersed in the world and business of 3D animation/modeling/rendering, or had been using Maya for a while. A good is example is how the book almost immediatley begins with the general workflow, how things work in big production houses, and what programs are usually used for different steps of the animation process. I have found this book to be invaluable in furthering my knowledge of 3D animation and Maya, but I stress that it must be used hand in hand with a book such as Maya Foundation if you are starting from the very beginning.
This is worth every penny.

I think some readers may be confused by the title, "The Art of Maya." This is not a coffe tale book showing some art made by Maya users. The title is a play on Sun Tzu's book, "The Art of War." That is exactly what this book is, it is a soup to nuts explaination of the "art" of using Maya.
This is a beginer's book that goes into great detail about the concepts of using Maya. Many newbies might prefer to just by advanced books and learn all the WOW tricks that Maya has to offer. Of course then those users don't know why they went through the process they did to create a stunning image, and are left without any creative energy.
This makes this book a MUST HAVE for beginers and intermediate users. Every bit of the under lying logic in how Maya works is explained.
This is also a good "reading" book too. The problem with other Maya books that have projects is that you can not sit down and read them without being in front of your computer to do the projects. With "The Art of Maya," you can set it next to your nightstand and just read a chapter or two before bedtime; you can learn things without having to sit in front of the box.

You know how some companies offer really slick little illustrated booklets detailing their products, the advantages they offer, and all the features they have in an attempt to get you to buy the product? Well that's basically what this book is. It's essentially a 200+ page advertisement for Maya. It doesn't really attempt to teach you how to do anything in particular using Maya, but it does gloss over most of the features and the sorts of things you can do once you learn it.

As a new Maya user and being brand new to 3-D modelling in general, I actually found it to be a decent and useful read. But I have to admit that I was hoping for, and expecting more of a tutorial. But it still gave me a decent "view from 10,000 feet" of the program, which is something few if any other books will give you. Also it is well written and very well illustrated, it just wasn't at all what I expected.

If you are considering buying it to learn Maya, look elsewhere. But if you are looking for a decent overview of Maya, or are evaluating various 3-D tools, this may be a decent book to buy.

Well let me start by saying this book is a great technical reference. If you're an absolute beginner like me than you'll find this book unbecoming of its title as an introduction to 3D graphics. With merely a single chapter devoted to explaining 3D computer graphics and a short synopsis in the beginning of each subsequent chapter it left me puzzled and I couldn't really understand why they would call this an introductory book. If your really interested in what every tool in Maya 8 does and what the software is capable of doing then you'll get lots of use out of this book as each tool is explained in detail. No tutorials, no work along projects and no beginners guide make this more of an intermediary book best suited for people who already have basic knowledge of computer graphics who are also using a learning series book or some other guide to teach themselves Maya. This book alone is definitely not intended to teach Maya or basic principals of computer graphics but does give you a great understanding of what the buttons in Maya do... now if it would only explain WHY I'd use that button, but I guess that's where the learning series books comes into play. I'll be ordering one or two of those next...

This book is excellent explaining all the concepts of the 3D world. And it explains all the interface, metodology and use of Maya in various projects. It's beautiful, is very informative, and you'll know every important detail about Maya and 3D in general.

Often Autodesks recommended path for learning Maya is not so hot, and this is an example of an innacurate assessment on their part of who should be reading this book. In fact there are aspects of many Autodesk books that I feel were not well planned, so you might want to explore other Maya books as well as Autodesks to see what works for you.
Apparently Autodesk sees this as an "introductory" book, and really it isn't, at all. Here's why. This book doesn't tell you "how" to do anything. It does tell you "what" things are and "why" you would use them in a very specific way, but nothing is explained in a user friendly way.
Essentially this is a book of quick overviews, but with almost nothing that will guide the reader through a step-by-step process to achieve any kind of end result. In fact many aspects of the book are almost stupidly ambiguous.
Here is a metaphor of how this book works. It's like if somebody was instructing you on how to build something but they only told you WHAT to do, but not HOW to do it. For example, say somebody decided to help you build a car. So the first thing they tell you is to "Put the engine together". You think great, here we go! Your first step is "to connect the transmission to the engine block." But you realize that the transmission isn't put together, so you ask "How do I build a transmission?" The response you get is, "put those parts together"... and that's all you get. In other words the information isn't wrong, it's just useless because it doesn't give you any genuine instruction. It doesn't tell you what parts go where or in what order, and often it doesn't even tell you where to find them. Much of this book works exactly in this manner.
With that said, if you already have an intermediate/advanced working knowledge of most everything Maya has to offer, this is probably a good book, because it gives specific overviews and general explanations on almost every aspect of Maya.
If you are new to Maya this book is completely useless. Maya calls this an "introductory" book, but it's so poorly thought out that the information comes across as being jumbled and incomplete.

It's a very good book if you knew how to use Maya.
It is a very good visual reference that shows the average scope of Maya as a CG tool.
It doesn't go through fine details or tutorials, but that is not the purpose of the book anyway.
I like to have this book when I am about to start a project or when I forget some basic commands of the tools it self.
It's sort of a main guide for when you get a little lost inside Maya features, or when you have a new idea and kind of looking for a better way to start your project. The book inspires your mind by visually showing many possible ideas related to the commands and features of Maya.
It also helps when you get too deep in the waters and you don't know where you are going anymore but all your valves and instruments are working ... then you resurface in order to see in which direction you were heading and what is the direction you want to go without loosing too much time researching...
A must have in your library this was my 12th book of Maya in my shelf and well worthy.

This is a THEORY book. If you don't understand the theory behind maya, pick this up. If you want tutorials, pick something else up.

This book is not another picture book, and its not really a tutorial book either. Its more of an explanation of how maya works and what things are used for, in a general sense. If you're picking up Maya for the first time I'd recommend Learning Autodesk Maya (and your version, which I'd recommend 8, which so far the tutorials are working fine in 8.5) If you're already a novice or higher maya user, and know your way around, this could prove useful.

After you've covered the material in a big tutorial book, keeping this one handy will help if you were to struggle on a specific task or forget how to do something, because theres plenty of explanation in this book.

I like how it explains the typical work pipeline, if you're doing this as a hobby but want to enter the industry someday, it will explain to you how daily work usually goes for each person, when working in teams on a pipeline, or how one person can control the entire pipeline when working alone.

A useful add to any maya users library, and one book can never cover everything there is to know about this program. This is my 2nd book covering just maya and found it interesting to read, but I'd start with a tutorial book for new maya users like myself.

this book gave me lots of things to learn off it, i havent finished it but i tooked so many notes off this that i need to write up my own notes on a book... i have like too many stickies on it that i cant really keep track off it. This book is great!